The Problem with 'Mana Tangata'

The key problem Māori Marsden had with the terms mana tangata, mana wahine, mana tāne is that they suggest that humans are the source of mana. However, the key principle is that we are potential vessels of mana never the source. He recognized, however, that quite a number of people have used these terms.

The second difficulty with mana tangata, wahine, tāne etc is that the grammar tells us that these are types of mana do not denote where the mana itself resides or can be found. This follows the convention that the suffix tells us something about the word that comes before. Hence, whare nui tells us that this is a big house, rākau tapu says that it is sacred tree and so on. Hence, mana tangata translates as ‘human mana’, a type of mana but not where it resides or can be found.

Māori’s preference was the expression, ‘te mana o te wahine, tāne, tangata’ etc. By contrast, this is a expression stating clearly where the mana can be found (the vessel) but not the type of mana. It is quite clear that this expression refers to the vessel or place in which the mana can be found not the type of mana.

With respect to types of mana, he only spoke of three and mentioned them in a number of compositions:

Mana Atua
Mana Tupuna
Mana Whenua

These are types of mana that are able to flow into the world in all sorts of combinations, expressions and in a variety of vessels. Hence, te mana o te tangata (wahine, tāne) is a combination of mana atua, mana tupuna, mana whenua.

Also, the traditional expressions for te mana o te wahine were terms like ‘te puhi ariki’ or ‘te tuhi māreikura’, ‘tapairu’ and so on. In traditional literature, the word mana itself seldom appeared and mana was referred to symbolically through many things such as the presence of fire. The story of Māui going to get the fire from Mahuika, for example, is a story about mana.

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